March 21, 2023 / 
March 17, 2023 / 
Friday, March 17th, beginning at 11 am, the NYC St Patrick's Day Parade in Manhattan begins on 5th Avenue at 44th Street and marches up to 79th Street. There are generally about 150,000 participants and about two million spectators. Click these links for Irish pub suggestions for each borough. For further details see - https://www.nycstpatricksparade.org/
Next Friday, March 17th at the NY Irish Center at 1040 Jackson near Vernon Blvd in Long Island City there's a St Patricks Day Celebration entitled '40 Shades of Green', from 3 - 9 pm. For $30 tickets and details see - https://www.newyorkirishcenter.org.
On Friday at 7.30 pm, Saturday at 1.30 and 7.30, and Sunday at 3 pm there are performances of Black female author Lorraine Hansberry's epic drama entitled The Sign in Sidney Brustein's Window in the Harvey Theatre at the Brooklyn Academy of Music at 651 Fulton Street in Brooklyn. They describe the play as follows, " ... Hansberry invites us into Greenwich Village in the 60s, crafting a razor-sharp portrait of a diverse group of friends whose progressive dreams can’t quite match reality. At the center are Sidney and Iris Brustein, fighting to see if their marriage—with all its crackling wit, passion, and petty cruelty—can survive Sidney’s ideals...". The play runs daily, except Mondays, through March 24th. For $35 & up tickets and details see - https://www.bam.org. Performances end March 24, 2023.
March is Music Month at the Pregones PRTT Theater at 575 Walton Avenue in the Bronx. On Saturday beginning at 7 pm Manuel Valera and his band, which they desribe as, "... New Cuban Express, creates a unique and distinctive style that mixes elements of Jazz, R&B, fusion, funk, and Cuban music... ". And on Sunday, beginning at 3 pm, Chantal Balestri whose performance is described as follows, " ... 
On Friday night, from 7 pm - 12 midnight, The Pride Center at 59 Wright Street on Staten Island is hosting the Spring Bling [kiki] Ball. There will be music and dancing. No admission was noted, but for more info and details see - https://twitter.com/pridecenterSI. They also have a website but this and the following event aren't posted there. https://www.pridecentersi.org
In 2017 I attended a Community Board meeting in Astoria where our urban planners talked about 
One of the biggest obstacles to erecting a rail connection into / out of LaGuardia is the disruption it would cause to existing commutes. Another major factor, particularly for those alternatives which provided the most direct connections into / out of Manhattan, was that a rail connection would have to tunnel below the end of LGA Runway 4-22 that stretches from the southwest section of the airport to the northeast section of the airport which ends in the East River. The reason such a tunnel is required, is because of FAA regulations surrounding construction limitations around an FAA airstrip. I picked up this information in a March 13, 2023 Engineering News Record report as well as in the FAA report noted below.
I took a look at a map of the Astoria neighborhood which lies between Manhattan and LaGuardia. It's an area with which I'm pretty familiar. A few of the air train alternatives included connecting the Astoria Blvd and the Ditmars Blvd N / W train MTA subway stops, as the jumping off point for a rail connection to LaGuardia Airport. This makes the most sense, as both the N and W subway lines are nowhere near capacity use, like the #7 train, so there's likely enough slack to handle a significant boost in ridership, if those lines were to be used to enable a public transit rail connection to LaGuardia Airport.
In 2022 there were 29 million passengers [79,000 per day] who traveled through LaGuardia. And from what I could gather from some of the Air Train Analysis reports by the Port Authority PANYNJ, it appears that an estimated 10% of passengers [3 million or 8,200 riders per day] currently use public transit.
Given the FAA restrictions on construction projects near airport runways as pointed out to us by Engineering News Record report of 3/13/23 referenced above, I suggest the PANYNJ build a connecting light rail from the N/ W lines in Astoria to the edge of the airport, ending in the southwest corner of the airport, at the end of the 4-22 runway at 19th Avenue and 81st Street [see map above right]. For the residents of this area, the advantage of this rail link would be better public transit, which in turn would likely raise property values, and make for a very easy any commute into the airport for workers.
So here's the American ingenuity piece. Set up the N / W trains that go to LaGuardia to have a few rail cars that can be unfastened from the end of that subway train, and can then be driven around the airport stopping at each of the terminals, before returning to the line and being refastened onto the next outgoing subway train. Or, in a manner similar to what they do with container shipping, have some cars that can be rolled off the subway train line and then pulled around the airport terminals on a conveyor, before circling back to be refastened to the next outgoing subway train.
What I visualize are subway cars at the end of the train, which can be disconnected and go vehicular around the airport. Or better yet, subway cars that can be motored a few blocks to a separate automated rail or street car-like system that takes the disconnected subway cars around the airport to all of the terminals, before returning to the starting point where they would be shuttled back to be reconnected to the next city bound MTA subway train.
I recognize that this option isn't currently offered by Kawasaki, Bombardier or Siemens, who represent about two thirds of the subway car industry. But this isn't rocket science, and there is plenty of pre-existing technology, like parts etc. to make this happen in about as much time [2 - 3 years] as it would take to complete the elevated rail line from either the Ditmars Blvd or Astoria Blvd subway station. NYS has a large Kawasaki subway car plant in Yonkers that might be up to the job.
Fresh, Fly and Fabulous is on exhibit at the Fashion Institute of Management at 227 West 27th Street in Chelsea from February 8th to April 23rd. The exhibit is dedicated to Hip Hop not just as music and fashion, but as a lifestyle and cultural statement. Hip Hop celebrates its 50th anniversary this year. Wednesday - Friday from noon to 8 pm and Saturday and Sunday from 10 am - 5 pm. There's an all day symposium on Friday, February 24th. For details see - https://www.fitnyc.edu/
March 3, 2023 / 
Fresh, Fly and Fabulous is on exhibit at the Fashion Institute of Management at 227 West 27th Street in Chelsea from February 8th to April 23rd. The exhibit is dedicated to Hip Hop not just as music and fashion, but as a lifestyle and cultural statement. Hip Hop celebrates its 50th anniversary this year. Wednesday - Friday from noon to 8 pm and Saturday and Sunday from 10 am - 5 pm. There's an all day symposium on Friday, February 24th. For details see - https://www.fitnyc.edu/
On Friday beginning at 6.30 pm Brooklyn Poets at 144 Montague Street in Brooklyn Heights is hosting a number of open mic readings. If you want to speak you have to rsvp a spot in advance. Featured speakers include Morgan Boyle and Joshua Garcia. For details and $7 tickets see - https://brooklynpoets.org/
February 28, 2023 / 
Sunday, March 5, 2023. The St. Pat's for All Parade in Sunnyside begins with speeches and music at 12 noon, and then kicks off from Skillman Avenue and 43rd Street in Sunnyside, Queens ending 15 blocks further east at 58th Street in Woodside. The St Pats for All Parade was founded in 2000 in response to the Manhattan St Pats Parade boycott of LGBTQ folks marching as openly gay. The Manhattan St Pats Parade has since dropped that policy and permits openly gay members of the community to march in the parade.
February 24, 2023 / 
February 17, 2023 / 
Jamaica JAMS. Jamaica JAMS is one of the largest events in Queens generally the first weekend of August. The event spans a couple of days and includes a concert on Friday evening in King Park, followed by a food and shopping festival the next day. The 
February 17, 2023 / 
A day commemorating Lincoln's birthday was first passed in Buffalo, New York in the early 1870's. Presidents Day originated as Washington's Birthday which was a holiday narrowly prescribed for federal government offices in Washington, D.C. in 1879. The holiday was dedicated to honoring the memory of the first American president, George Washington who was born on February 22, 1732.
February 11, 2023 / 
February 7, 2023 / 
February 3, 2023 / 
January 27, 2023 / 
January 20, 2023 / 
On Sunday from 11 am - 3.30 pm there's a Chinese Lunar New Year Firecracker celebration in Sara Roosevelt Park at Chrystie and Forsyth on the Lower East Side in East Chinatown.
The Chinese Lunar New Year in celebration of the year of the rabbit begins Sunday, January 22, 2022 and runs through February 9th, 2023. There will be celebrations throughout NYC and we'll update you beginning this weekend and beyond. Details coming.
On Saturday January 21, 2023 from 10 am - 1 pm there's a family friend workshop where you can create a fan for lunar new year at Wave Hill at 4900 Independence Avenue in the Riverdale neighborhood of the Bronx. It's Free w/ admission to the grounds. For details see www.wavehill.org or https://www.nycgovparks.org/parks/wave-hill/events/2023/01/21/family-art-project-fan-for-lunar-new-year1
* Since March of 2020, we've been in a bit of a pandemic spin. The 2020 pandemic essentially halted most hospitality businesses and softened demand for some services, but drove high demand for both durable and non-durable goods. This is on the demand side. Meanwhile on the supply side, businesses were closing down, or working at far less than capacity, because of the health impact of the pandemic. For example in China, they didn't just appear to shutter businesses, but almost entire cities, to curb the spread of CoVid. China is where much of our electronics are made so this impacted the availability / supply of electronics at a time when Americans were spending more on them, because they weren't traveling, vacationing or even eating out much, so they had extra cash to spend on items, most notably electronics.
And the expansive monetary policy, which was executed by taking the federal funds interest rate to nearly zero in March of 2020, and by pushing $4 trillion cash into the economy via purchases of bonds, wasn't reined in for years, and that withdrawal finally began in 2022. We'll discuss this more further down in this report.
* In 2021 things began to normalize as vaccinations rolled out and we began to gain a better understanding of how to mitigate the health impact of the CoVid pandemic. But the year wasn't a straight line out of the pandemic, as the new variants continued to wreak havoc with our collective assessment of how risky it would be to return to normal.
Putin's military intervention / disruption, of course added risk to the global economy. Especially in two key segments of the economy which includes food and energy. Russia supplies about 12% of the world's oil, and along with Ukraine accounts for about a third of the world's wheat and barley. Hence Putin's war added significant inflationary pressure to both energy and food.
To summarize what I laid out above, there were swings in demand fueled by lifestyle changes caused by the pandemic, including generous fiscal spending by the U.S. government. And there were significant supply side swings in capacity, which were driven by worker availability arising from health concerns.
What's next is a look at a multitude of economic statistics with some nominal interpretation of what I expect to happen, all things being equal [meaning no further major disruptions], in 2023.
Businesses and Households balance sheets also improved, in part because of stimulus funds and in part because spending was held back on services, like travel and hospitality, during the pandemic. Spending came roaring back in 2021, as the pandemic began to fade, but in 2022 it has subsided considerably. Most recently, retail sales were down about 1% in December of 2022, so the economy is definitely cooling.
So far the strong job market, with rising compensation, and up until 2022, a rising stock and housing market, added to Americans' confidence and contributed to robust spending in 2021 [see chart at right].
If I were Jerome Powell, I would increase the Fed Funds rate a .25% at the next FOMC [Federal Open Market Committee] meeting at the end of January and signal that I might be done. And the only reason I would raise if .25% is because the market expects that and I wouldn't want to spook them, not because the economy needs further braking.
China has rolled back its restrictive CoVid policies. This will increase the supply of semiconductors, which should reduce price pressures in categories such as vehicles and electronics, which account for about 3% of the 8% of inflation we experienced in 2022 [light and dark blues of the chart below right].
And food, also experienced inflation due not just to the war in the Ukraine, but also climate change weather disruptions of drought and damaging storms. In the chart below right that's denoted in green and represents about 1% of the inflation last year.
Disinfo
January 13, 2023 / 
According to Wikipedia, the number 13 has been considered unlucky beginning with a Norse mythological story about how the 13th guest caused the death of a dinner host. They tell us that the connection between unlucky 13 and Friday didn't start until early in the 1800's, specifically citing an 1834 play called 'The Finesse of the Scribbles', wherein one of the characters says that he was born on Friday the 13th and that is the origin of all of his misfortunes. Greek and Spanish cultures cite Tuesday the 13th as the unlucky day. Friday the 13th occurs at least once every year and there is no proof that it is any different from any other day. So while I'd recommend caution on any day, I wouldn't hesitate to do just about anything you normally do on this day.
January 13, 2023 / 
January 5, 2023 / 
January 5, 2023 / 
On Friday there's a Three Kings Day Parade and celebration from 11 am - 2 pm at the Museo del Barrio at 1230 5th Avenue [at 104th / 105th Street] on the UES. They are also hosting a post holiday sale at their gift shop with 15% off most items. For details see - https://www.elmuseo.org/
The Third Avenue holiday market at 2817 3rd Avenue between 148th and 149th Streets is open for its final day on Friday, January 6th from 11 am - 7 pm.
January 1, 2023 / 
Weather Forecast for New Years Eve. It's still a bit early to obtain a reliable weather forecast for New Years Eve, which is a bit less than four weeks away.
December 23, 2022 / 
The Lightscape Show at the Brooklyn Museum continues through the holidays.
NYC Weather. There's going to be some semi-serious precipitation [at present 2 plus inches] beginning Thursday afternoon around 4 pm, continuing until Friday about 4 pm. The temperatures are expected to rise to well above freezing, so it's almost certain to be rain in the city. As for the rest of the week, no rain Monday through Wednesday, and none is expected Saturday and Sunday, as folks head home for the holidays.
As you likely heard, we are in the midst of experiencing a 'tripledemic'. The triple refers to CoVid, flu and RSV. RSV is short for respiratory syncytial virus, which is a virus that causes symptoms like those associated with a cold, but which can cause serious negative health issues for infants and the elderly. As usual, the TV news teleprompter readers and their writers appear to report whatever they're told, without actually thinking about the information they're conveying. And since they're in the business of attracting viewers' and readers' attention, they seem to have a tendency to sensationalize almost everything they report, including the weather.
Understanding what's happening with the flu this season in NYS, also doesn't seem to be intelligently reported, as the TV news teleprompter readers and their script writers all seem to parrot one another with some alarming statistics. Alarming the public is good for ratings, so I reckon the broadcasters are doing what their bosses want them to do, but like the Boy Who Called Wolf, they're doing a disservice to the public and in the long term eventually a disservice to themselves, as the public is going to ignore them when another real health emergency arises.
What happened since CoVid began in earnest in early 2020, is that people started masking up, social distancing and self-isolating. All of these precautions not only mitigate the transmission of CoVid - but also the flu. In part this is why the 2020 - 2021 flu numbers were close to nothing, and the 2021 - 2022 numbers were also very much subdued. Now, as we are in the beginning of the 2022 - 2023 flu season, the flu appears to be picking up where it left off in early 2020, before CoVid hit.
On the NYC.gov Health website I noticed that the number of Emergency Department visits for Influenza Like Illnesses, which they shorthand to ILL, have risen dramatically from 2021 to 2022, as have admissions - BUT the Emergency Department Admissions vis a vis the visits as a percentage has dropped to about half in 2022, versus what they were in 2021. That said, the overall number of people admitted for flu increased fairly substantially. See charts.
On April, 27, 2020 USA Today published the results of an investigation into whether hospitals were paid more for CoVid patients on a ventillator than for flu patients on a ventillator. The higher payments for CoVid patients was true, but the study didn't find any 'gaming the system' on the part of hospitals. What's meant by this is that USA Today didn't find any falsification of data by hospitals in order to obtain the higher CoVid payment for the use of their ventillator. As you can see from the chart provided by KFF, which is a non-profit focused on providing healthcare information, about $31 billion in federal government spending was targeted at providing relief to healthcare providers treating patients with CoVid.
New Cases / Hospitalizations / Deaths. In NYC we've been seeing about 300 new cases per day and on average there are about 4,000 people in NYC who have contracted and are living with CoVid. Also in NYC, as of today, about 130 patients are in the hospital with CoVid, and about a dozen folks died of it within the past day. About 14% of those tested at NYC clinics and hospitals tested positive for CoVid, but these numbers don't include the at home tests, so I don't know how meaningful a statistic the % testing positive is anymore.
Ethnicity. Murdoch's Fox News / America's Disinformation Network Seems to be Dumbing Down White New Yorkers. Given George Washington, nearly 250 years ago, mandated that his troops be vaccinated, one would think that people today would recognize the value of protecting one's health via vaccinations. On many news programs, and for many measured categories, pundits use Whites as a sort of established national standard, when evaluating the progress being made by people in other demographic groups. Historically Whites have come out on top, because they've been members of the governing class, and the ethnic majority since this nation's founding.
Murdoch media outlets have the predominant share of media in NYC, as Murdoch controls the Fox TV network, Fox 5, WNYW Channel 9, the Wall St Journal and the NY Post. Many of these Murdoch's outlets have done their audiences a disservice by not properly informing them vis a vis vaccines and vaccinations, in spite of the CoVid policies the company has implemented for itself [so Mr. Murdoch wants us to listen to his pundits as they say one thing & pay no attention to what Mr. Murdoch & Cos do, which is quite another thing].
1. Stay up to date on your CoVid vaccinations. As time goes on and this abates, perhaps we can back off this regimen and like flu, it will be something we'll vaccinate against as we age.
December 16, 2022 / 
* On Sunday at 3.30 pm the LaGuardia Performing Arts Center hosts a performance of the Nutcracker ballet in LIC. Tickets are $21 at https://www.lpac.nyc.
So, when I heard that the strike was actually happening on Thursday late afternoon, I dropped everything and headed down to the New York Times office building in Midtown Manhattan. I had a hunch that the strikers would be disbanding - if not gone - by the time the TV news ended at 7 pm. 
The union, which won't negotiate with management in person, incited the strike to prod management into moving forward with the contract renewal negotiations on a contract that expired in March of 2021. The negotiations included the fate of the pension vis a vis a 401K, medical benefits - specifically fertility insurance coverage, flex time for working in / out of the office, and of course pay. 
December 10, 2022 / 
On Saturday, from 11.30 am - 3.30 pm in Astoria, along Steinway Street between 31st and 38th Streets, Mr. & Mrs. Santa Claus will be giving out gifts while supplies last and there will holiday entertainment and displays.
December 2, 2022 / 
December 1, 2021 / 
November 25, 2022 / 
NYC Holiday Markets Forecast. I think the holiday markets should be good this year, as they are stocked with locally hand crafted goods as well as other items from around the world.
November 11, 2022 / 
November 4, 2022 / 
* Sunday, November 6, 2022 at 2 am - Daylight Savings Time. This may be the last year where we will 'fall back' by moving our clocks back one hour starting at 2 am Sunday or before going to bed Saturday night.
November 2, 2022 / 
October 28, 2022 / 
October 26, 2022 / Local Government & Politics / National Government & Politics / News Analysis & Opinion / Gotham Buzz NYC.
NYC Weather for Halloween. It's too early for a solid forecast for the Halloween weekend, but that said the normal weather around the time of Halloween is usually about 60 during the daytime and in the mid 40's at night. It's too early to tell what the precipitation will be as we approach Halloween, but we provide weather updates each Friday on the front page of this site which you can access by clicking the header above.
September 23, 2022 / 
On Saturday, the Global Citizen Concert returns to the Great Lawn in Central Park which lies between 5th Avenue and Central Park West and between 72nd Street and 86th Street. The gates open at 2 pm and the concert begins at 4 pm. You must bring printed tickets as mobile tickets are not being accepted. Admission $250 - $299 via www.ticketmaster.com. For further details on the concert see https://www.globalcitizen.org/en/festival/nyc/2022/
September 27, 2022 / 
NYC Weather. The temperature highs will be in the low 80's on Tuesday & Wednesday, dropping to the low 70's on Thursday and the mid 60's on Friday., The temperature lows will rise from the mid 60's on Monday & Tuesday to the low 70's on Wednesday, and then fall into the mid to low 50's on Thursday and Friday. The winds will be 10 - 15 mph all week. The humidity will be 55% - 65% all week, except on Friday when it falls to 45% - 55%. There's a small chance of a small amount of rain in Thursday, with the probability gone by mid afternoon.
September 13, 2022 / 
On Wednesday, September 7th the Catholic schools in NYC reopen for the new school year.
August 12, 2022 / 
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August 9, 2022 / 
November 18, 2022 / 
Manhattan
July 29, 2022 / 
July 18, 2022 / 
June 24, 2022 / 
June 28, 2022 / 
June 24, 2022 / 
June 14, 2022 / 
On March 17, 2022 the NYS CoVid general restrictions under the H.E.R.O. Act expired. The expiration did not include the masks mandate requirement on NYC & NYS public transit. 
May 29, 2022 / 
In the photo at right is just one of thousands of artworks for sale in a prior year at the Washington Square Outdoor Art Exhibit which begins Saturday and runs through Monday.
May 2022 / 
May 17, 2022 / 
May 3, 2022 / 
April 29, 2022 / 
April 26, 2022 /
April 13, 2022 / 
In Part VI, we're going to zoom into the current situation, looking at their wars are being financed, recent politics in both Russia and Ukraine, and popular support for the war in each nation.
April 4, 2022 /
See for yourself on these two WSJ pages before they hopefully have the decency or shame to take it down.
March 28, 2022 / 
March 21, 2022 / 
multiparty democracy, many political scientists and watchdogs consider Hungary to have experienced democratic backsliding during Orbán's tenure. Orbán's attacks on the European Union, while accepting its money and funneling it to his allies and family have also led to characterizations of his government as a kleptocracy..."
So, to answer the Tucker's question, why should we hate Putin, I've included a few photos of Putin's recent handiwork. At right and below is an man injured by Putin's goons, followed by another man that Putin's goons killed, and further down is one of many locations, housing some of the 3.5 million Ukrainian refuges fleeing the war. Another 6 million Ukrainians have been displaced within their own nation. And countless others have been murdered by Putin's unprovoked invasion and war.
March 14, 2022 / 
In Part II, a week ago, I talked about how Australian born billionaire, mass media propagandist Rupert Murdoch and dictator Vladimir Putin's tactics share many similarities. They are differentiated in that Rupert Murdoch uses economic muscle and propaganda to get indirect control / influence over the corporations and governments he wants to plunder. While Vladimir Putin also uses economic muscle and propaganda - but enhances it with a Nazi tactic by adding violence and force to the mix - to obtain direct control over the corporations and governments he wants to plunder. All of these tactics were used by the Nazis to gain control - first of Germany and then a significant portion of Europe.
Then I delved into the importance of the Dnieper River, which flows south from Smolensk in Russia through the Ukraine and into the Black Sea. It's important because currently Russia has limited access to the world waterways via the Baltic Sea which is treacherous for much of the year, and the Black Sea which is a body of water shared by many nations, including many of the former Soviet Republics, including Ukraine.
March 7, 2022 / 
Last week I provided a look at some of the topline stats someone who wanted to know what was going on might ask. We researched the size of the two nations in terms of population, economies, industries and technology. Ukraine came in well ahead of what I had thought, while Russia came in behind what I had expected to find.
Lastly, I took a look at an Australian born Madman's, American-based mass media outlets' coverage, of the Russian invasion of Ukraine. The billionaire's name is Rupert Murdoch, and his organizations' daily distorted coverage of people, places and events is - as a whole - appears to be manipulative propaganda. His propaganda techniques are not unlike - but far more sophisticated than - the propaganda Putin is spreading in Russia.
March 1, 2022 / 
The current NYC vaccination rate is 77%, with another 9% having received at least one dose [86%]. The current NYS vaccination rate is 75%, with another 12% having received at least one dose [87%]. The current U.S. vaccination rate is 65%, with another 12% having received at least one dose [77%].
For the United States the same rates are 8% positive new cases [this is a week old number compared to the others herein], about 84,878 new cases, about 8,642 hospitalizations [this is a week old number compared to the others herein] and 1,964 daily deaths.
February 7, 2022 / 
As I walked and listened I looked around at all of the policemen gathered in honor of a fellow member of the fraternal order of policemen – not just of New York City but of NYS - and for that matter - the U.S. All of the police men and women were standing, some standing silently listening to the speeches, while others made small talk with each other, between the speeches, about their kids, their families, their jobs, their departments [homicide / detectives / street patrolmen], cars and boats, as well as chatting about which police department or organization they represented.
I noticed the badges sewn to their coats, representing Trenton and Teaneck New Jersey, Suffolk and Nassau Counties, New York State, and of course the NYPD, as well as a smattering of policemen from more distant communities. They projected a sense of sadness and courtesy, as I made my way through the crowd. I sensed that they must also have felt some measure of comfort, standing there, side by side with others like themselves, knowing that they are supported by so many others who share their sense of duty, ready to face down danger.
February 7, 2022 / 
The cost to us, the American people [the British and Australians as well] is that many critical issues are never properly addressed by the government officials selected by Murdoch, because his favored pols are generally chosen and supported based on what they will do for the totally self-serving billionaire - not the public. Hence Murdoch pols don't appear to reflect the people's will, but rather are chosen because Murdoch mass media outlets have manipulated the views of enough voters via their distorted daily Murdoch mass media 'news' intake, to enable Murdoch's favored pols to get elected. Nazi propagandist Joseph Goebbels employed these same kind of tactics, on an unsuspecting public, back in the early 1930's, in Germany.
Reining in the guns used in violent crime in NYC, is one of many such issues that seem to be given Murdoch's special brand of propagandistic 'news' treatment. Murdoch's news outlets' reports appear to pander to gun owners and the NRA [5.5 million members], who are outspoken and generally against gun control. According to a November 13, 2020 report by Gallup, about 32% of Americans own a gun and about 44% live in a household where there is a gun owner. Hence, gun owners represent a fairly sizeable block of Murdoch's mass media audience, and his news reports pander to them, just as the pander to other voting blocks that Murdoch media seek to manipulate.
January 28, 2022 / 
In Australia - where Murdoch has been operating all his life - former Prime Minister Kevin Rudd described, "Murdoch's media empire as a cancer on democracy" because of Murdoch media news omissions and distortions.
Updated January 26 from 1/24/2022 / 
Last week, after several rounds of bidding, a consortium of investors, including SNL Comedians Pete Davidson & Colin Jost; Architect, Developer & Contractor Ron Castellano; and Night Club Owner Paul Italia purchased a 2,100 ton de-commissioned Staten Island ferry boat - the JFK - for $280,100. The purchase prices was only $100 above the next nearest bid, after the price doubled during the bidding process - up from $125,000 - after the starting bid had to be lowered from $250,000 because of a lack of early interest.
January 18, 2022 / 
The outlier in the year end crime stats, which were up slightly from 2020, was that thefts were down almost 19%. This may have something to do with the fact that fewer people are out and about, so thieves have fewer to prey upon and the victims have fewer distractions and events where thefts may occur.
January 3, 2022 / 
December 27, 2021 / 
How is it that network TV news, still a primary source of information in this nation - and the only source by many of the uneducated - can get a story so wrong?
In the graphic at right you see a headline from FT, which is the Financial Times of London, noting how something that should be common sense has become a political hot potato. At the end of this update on the Omicron variant, we'll take a look at how science and the truth are being distorted by millionaires and billionaire(s) in what appears an attempt to manipulate voters perceptions. The goal is to change the perceptions of their viewers enough, so their viewers will vote for the candidates chosen by the propaganda billionaire and his friends. The end game is, of course, getting the billionaire / propaganda machine selected pols into office, so they can fill their pockets with the taxpayers' money, and obtain legislative changes that are anti-democratic.
A testament to the Omicron variants transmissibility is that on Friday, December 17, 2021 NYS saw its highest number of new CoVid cases [21,027] in a single day since the pandemic began according to an New York Times report. In NYC the infection rate nearly doubled in just three days, rising from 3.9% to 7.8% from Thursday, December 9 to December 12, 2021 according to a December 16, 2021 NBC report.
The first Omicron virus case was first detected on November 8, 2021 in South Africa. The first case detected in the U.S. was in San Francisco on November 22, 2021. Four days later, on November 26, 2021, the World Health Organization [WHO] designated Omicron a CoVid variant [B1.1.529]. As of December 5, 2021 there were eight Omicron cases in NYS, most of which were found in NYC.
September 21, 2021 / 
August 31, 2021 / 
So we're going to take a look at a number of the NYC crime statistics, and then follow up with an analytical look at some of the issues driving gun related violence, before closing with a look at the distorted, deceitful and destructive coverage provided by Murdoch's Fox News & Propaganda.
The graphic at right shows what is called the 'Iron Pipeline' which is Interestate 95 which runs from New York to Florida. This interestate highway is used to transport guns / weapons across state lines from mostly red Republican controlled states with lax gun control laws to blue states that have passed stronger gun control laws.
August 9, 2021 / 
I found a chart that I found of great interest in an August 5, 2021 story in the Gothamist, which was acquired by NPR in 2018. The chart shows how the original CoVid is almost non-existent in the U.S. today, while the Delta variant has risen to represent over 90% of all new cases.
August 3, 2021 / 
The second Trump impeachment trial began today, Tuesday, February 9th, 2021. Generally I find the rushing of the trial to be an insult to the American people, and the U.S. Constitution philosophies of due process and rule of law. The government officials prosecuting and managing the trial should take all the time required to educate the American people about who Donald Trump really is - not who he says he is.
March 22, 2021 /
Somehow amidst the din of Murdoch mass media hyped criticism, the real headline was buried.
In the reporting over the past month or so I DID NOT SEE EVEN ONE REFERENCE TO THE RUSSIAN WITHDRAWAL from Afghanistan in the 1980’s. NOT ONE! Why does that matter?
Australian born billionaire, Rupert Murdoch - as is too often the case - led the rest of the mindless mass media, like the Pied Piper. On August 15, 2021, the Wall St. Journal published an OpEd by the ‘Editorial Board’. The ‘Editorial Board’ appears to be the pen name of billionaire Rupert Murdoch who owns and controls the paper. The ‘Editorial Board’ said published the narrative that Biden was incompetent and had messed things up, with scant reference to history or a holistic presentation of the facts.
May 17, 2021 /
March 15, 2021 /
On Wednesday, January 6, 2021, Rudy Giuliani joined Donald Trump and Donny junior at a Trump rally in Washington, D.C. near the White House. The Donald had promoted this gathering as something 'wild' and related to his seemingly phony stop the steal / election fraud fundraising claims. At the rally Trump told his supporters, numbering about 5,000 [per the park permit] to march down to the Capitol and that he'd be there with them.
Weather. There's a 60% probability of about a third inch of rain beginning sometime between 3 and 6 pm Sunday. The rest of the weekend should be clear. The temperature highs will be around 80 and the lows in the mid 60's all weekend. Humidity will range from 50% - 60% all weekend, except Sunday night when it rises to near 80% due to the rain. The winds will vary throughout the weekend from about 15 mph Friday, to 5 mph Saturday and 10 mph Sunday. All in all, not a bad weather weekend.
Billionaire Rupert Murdoch & his NY Post Order Us to Fire the Mayor
Murdoch & his NY Post Seem to Want a Puppet NANNY not a Mayor
July 14, 2019 / NYC Neighborhoods / NYC Politics / New Analysis, Opinion & Satire / Gotham Buzz NYC.
Multi-Billionaire Rupert Murdoch, the puppet master of the world's three largest English-speaking democracies, has dictated that we must remove Mayor de Blasio NOW.
Murdoch's NY Post headline was almost predictable. Mayor de Blasio was campaigning in Iowa over the weekend, and while he was away, there was a 25 hour power outage in west midtown [Saturday]. MURDOCH & his minions on the NY POST Editorial Board want the Mayor fired - like he is their nanny who left town - without tucking them in that night.
In the photo at right is multi-billionaire Rupert Murdoch who controls two [Newscorp & Fox Corp] of the six largest U.S. media companies which control about 80% of U.S. media. Murdoch also became the largest shareholder of Disney / ABC in the Spring of 2019 [which brings Murdoch's control / influence to three of the six largest media companies in the U.S.]. This huge media merger was made possible thanks to a waive through by the 'Trump Department of Justice'. Murdoch appears to have turned Australia and Britain into Murdoch-controlled banana republics, and seems well on his way to doing the same here in the United States.
I'm nearly certain the Donald, Murdoch's current nanny president, would remove Mayor de Blasio - were it in the Donald's power to do so. Since the Donald appears to have carried out so many of Murdoch's instructions since coming to office just two and a half years ago.
- CLICK here to read the rest of our report about Murdoch's NY Post propaganda 'news' distortion using a power outage in Midtown NYC to call for firing Mayor de Blasio.
Billionaire Rupert Murdoch & his NY Post Order Us to Fire the Mayor
Murdoch & his NY Post Seem to Want a Puppet NANNY not a Mayor
July 14, 2019 / NYC Neighborhoods / NYC Politics / New Analysis, Opinion & Satire / Gotham Buzz NYC.
Continued.
Trump's Corrupt Quid Pro Quo Gifts to Murdoch for Propaganda?
Trump fired all of the U.S. Attorneys in the spring of 2017, less than 24 hours after being told to do so, by Murdoch's Pinocchio Pundit Sean Hannity. The NY U.S. Attorney, Preet Bahara, was investigating charges that Murdoch's company was engaged in an illegal hacking scandal again [the first one was in Britian], along with allegations of sexual misconduct at Murdoch's company [these have plagued Murdoch's company for many years].
That same year [2017], Trump's FCC Chairman Ajit Pai proposed waiving the ownership limits on U.S. television stations, in advance of Murdoch's Fox News deal to acquire numerous TV stations from Sinclair Broadcasting in early 2018 [deal fell through].
And Trump's Department of Justice waived through Murdoch's inverted takeover of Disney / ABC whereby Murdoch became Disney / ABC's largest shareholder. Murdoch appears to be using Disney / ABC Chairman, Bob Iger, like he uses Prime Ministers and Presidents ... to do his dirty work, in exchange for funding and [media] support.
Lastly, but not insignificantly, Murdoch's 'fake news' President recognized the Syrian Golan Heights as Israeli territory. It seems no coincidence that multi-billionaire Rupert Murdoch and former Vice President Dick Cheney [were these two co-conspirators in producing the Iraqi fake weapons of mass destruction in the early 2000's?] are major stakeholders in Genie Energy, which has significant 'holdings' in the Israeli-occupied Syrian Golan Heights. The United Nations and the rest of the world still consider the Golan Heights to be Syrian territory occupied by the Israelis.
Murdoch seems to use his media to discredit, displace and replace Australian Prime Ministers [five prime ministers in a little more than five years] and British Prime Ministers [three prime ministers in a little more than three years] so he can get those nation's leaders to do what he wants.
Murdoch has a monopoly share of newspapers and the majority share of TV stations in Australia - where after decades of dictating to Australians - most of them are still ignorant of the fact that Murdoch has near monopoly control of their media, even though he is neither a resident nor citizen. And Murdoch controls two of the three most dominant newspapers in Britain and an oligarch's share of the British TV market [Murdoch would have had a majority share of the British TV market had not Comcast outbid him in 2018 - and again he is neither a resident nor citizen of Britain].
The result is that the government officials in both Australia and Britain pretty much seem to say piss off to the public good, and do what Murdoch tells them to do. And if they don't, Murdoch seems ready, willing and able to use his overwhelming share of the nation's mass media outlets to propagandistically discredit and replace them. It is in this manner that Murdoch appears to control these nations.
One has to ask how much of a democracy Australia and Britain really are, when one man has so much control over the information used by voters to make their decisions prior to casting their votes?
If Mayor de Blasio becomes the next president - Murdoch and his NY Propaganda Post would lose the coddling by their current nanny president - the Donald. This seems to explain why Murdoch appears to have used his NY Post, in a what seems a Goebbels-inspired effort, to discredit the Mayor. It appears Murdoch is hellbent on pre-emptively eliminating Mayor de Blasio as a presidential candidate even before de Blasio begins gaining traction with the American electorate.
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